Ash
by Huntress Under Seige
Summary: Ash, and a single white stag. Ghostly white, faded through, with eyes so cold and distant they could have been starlight.


**Wrote this to explore Thranduil's motives through the Hobbit movies, as well as kind of get started fleshing him out a bit. My interpretation of him may be a bit off, as I haven't read the books, but I hope you enjoy what I do have to offer. **

**Inspired by Legolas's little insight we get when he and Tauriel are at Mount Gungabad watching the orcs and bats prepare for war. Prepare for sads.**

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><p><strong>Ash<strong>

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><p>Everything he had done, he had done for his wife.<p>

In retrospect, he couldn't bring her back. She had been long gone, since Legolas had been naught but a young adult; old enough to blame, young enough to not understand. The blow had been swift to the elven king and all his kin, but to the elven prince it was moreso. The counterbalance to his father's caring, if not distant nature, was suddenly ripped away from him in a battle whose victory counted for nothing.

Not in Thranduil's eyes.

The sight of the mithril diamonds, nestled in an oaken chest after years of being gone, stolen from them in battle, nearly brought him to tears. Sapphire eyes watched the pieces of starlight shimmer within the mountain – at long last, he could have something, just a token of his wife. All these years of bowing down to lesser creatures, petty mortal beings, would be worth it, if he could have one symbol of his past love brought to him.

The necklace…he had to have it.

This was not dragon sickness, the ailment of the dwarves standing before him – but love sickness, a twisted and much more powerful magic, for elves love only once in their lives. He could feel the beginnings of his own Fading looming in the distance. Oh, he had thousands of years left on his throne – but what are thousands compared to an immortality?

And then the box was closed. The defining slap of the metal clasp shattered his heart, and broke any tentative trust he may have had with the filthy dwarves. Filthy in honor, filthy in manners, filthy in heart.

That was the last he had seen of the diamonds. Dwarves may have been the most stubborn of creatures in Middle Earth, but an elf's definition of "never" held a note of terminal promise few other races could guarantee.

The dwarves had slighted him and his people one too many times; when the dragon came, he held no compassion. For it was not the _dwarves _he had come for, with his army and great white stag, but the diamonds. But Smaug had already breeched, and not even his swiftest warriors could have made it to the golden stronghold before the death bringer could.

He would not deny the satisfaction in seeing that mountain burn.

It was after that incident – driven by a different kind of sickness now – that Thranduil sealed off his kingdom. Any elf not of the Greenwood – before the spiders had come – had been greeted with select suspicion, but mostly welcoming arms. Any non-elf was to be eliminated on sight.

The darkness grew deep within the recesses of Dol Guldur, its brand of magic oh so similar to the poison that thrived within the elven king. Breathing in the damp air, once so comforting to the king, brought him back to that fateful decision to launch an attack on Mount Gundabad, a once sacred place stained with the evils of Sauron.

The attack that had cost him his wife and, in a round-about way, his son.

He would lose no more to the greed of dwarves.

And the darkness grew, pulsing in time with the arrival of a company of the descendent from the very dwarf that had denied him his right to those precious gems. He locked them up, wanting to extract his revenge slowly, over time; his suffering had not ended, and neither would theirs.

It was, in part, an act of madness. Vicious jealousy, simply because they had a tangible home they could fight for and protect.

_A quest to reclaim a homeland and slay a dragon. _Was that not how he had phrased it? And damn them for being able to gather their weapons and fight for what they valued above all else; their precious mountain and the gold within.

He could not sail away to find his wife. Legolas was not ready to rule, young and impudent as he was, and Thranduil would not give up his right to be king all too willingly. Pragmatic arguments and heated emotional turmoil drove the king further into his darkness, ignoring the signs screaming at him to rally his forces.

Until an orc gave him the final clue, and everything fell into place.

He gathered his army and sealed his kingdom, protecting innocents from what he could already sense. Destroying them at the source was not his goal, but the _diamonds – _his right and proper home – he could finally reclaim. He could seek revenge against those that had taken them from him, and with every orc he slayed, the long festered hatred simmered away, slowly at first, only to return once he saw the price his people had paid.

Wandering through the streets and alleyways of Dale, the freshly fallen snow covering his soldier's bodies with the utmost of care, their armor still shining, even when buried beneath filth. Everywhere he looked, he only saw her.

The soldiers were not soldiers, they were _her, _alive and fighting once more the enemy that had taken her from him.

He lost everything in that battle. His wife. His son. His diamonds.

Without his stag – another thing he lost – he could have easily taken ahold of another mount. No king should have to brace his return on foot, taking a mere fraction of his forces back with him. No king should ever engage in such an act.

Thorin Oakenshield had, and look where it had gotten him.

The line of Durin was dead, and it left a bitter taste in the elf king's mouth. Dain could not be counted on for any favor from the elves. Legolas cared not for the jewels in that mountain, seemingly resistant to the memories they carried. He had not been born, but shouldn't the stories have been enough?

The great King Thranduil of Mirkwood returned, on foot, broken and bleeding through the plains ravaged by corpses. Any rogue orcs that were encountered were dispatched of immediately, as his icy temper had hardened him into nothing more than a slave to the blade, hardwired for easy destruction.

By the time he reached his great gates, he had all but retreated into himself. The once bright wit dulled to a murky sneer; the vibrant sapphire eyes shattered to the coldest depths of the ocean.

He too, in sleep, walked among the stars. Each day waking up was harder to do, and he knew what he had begun. But with no willing heir – for how could he call upon Legolas now, having failed him not once, but twice? – how was the kingdom to run?

It couldn't.

The great kingdom of Mirkwood, plagued once more by Hobbits and dwarves and rogue elves, adventures in the shadows hidden from a sick and fading king, crumbled. Until one day, all that was remained, was ash.

Ash, and a single white stag. Ghostly white, faded through, with eyes so cold and distant they could have been starlight.

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><p><strong>Reviews are always nice, as this is my first go round into the Tolkien fandom. Let me know how I did!<br>**

**3 Huntress**


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